Saturday 16 April 2011

National 12 Stage Relay

So the National 12 stage relays have come and gone, first of all a well done to Tipton for their late late show in their victory and to all the other teams that competed. The Sale team were hit by a succession of withdrawals in the weeks leading up to the race and our overall position (32nd) is the lowest that I have been involved in.
My race it self was hard to judge, last year i ran 27:15 but at the same time I was set off in 3rd, quickly moved up to 1st and then was dragged through by quicker runners catching up. This year it was a different story, I was set off in 27th place after Jamie Roden had gone the wrong way on his short leg (he thought he was doing the 6 stage the numpty) and didn't have much to aim at for the first part of the race. I caught my first runner just after the first hill but was then on my own again until the turn around on the long drag. I'll admit I suffered until then as I always forget how long that part is. I took a few more places once I hit the down hill and round the pool and sprinted up the finishing straight. My time was 28:01, as you can imagine, not overly impressed but the time difference between each race (from last year) is steadily coming down.

The next few weeks are fairly hectic in terms of racing and training. I will be racing the Salford 10k on Good Friday before heading off to Croatia for a weeks holiday, I still will be running just not the sessions. On my return I have Matt Barnes' Wedding and before the end of May I'll fit in a 3k and 1500 (probably at the Trafford open meeting and BMC respectively). My first steeplechase will not be until the 4th of June in the BAL in Cardiff i will probably follow that up in the BMC at Watford.

In terms of my barefoot revolution there have been a few additions to my schedue. After every session I complete on the track I am doing at least 800m barefoot as part of my warm down and of course still enjoying my Kinvara, so much so I have bought another pair, this 'livestrong' esque pair look pretty cool and still have all the benefits. I'm actually finding that when I run in my hurricanes my achilles, in my problematic right leg, aches almost as soon as I start running. Could this be the end of my supportive shoes?

It may be a couple of weeks until my next blog but I will endeavor to fit it in where possible.

Bailey

Monday 4 April 2011

The Dent 14.1 mile

I completely forgot to say about Matt Barnes' stag do and the Dent 14 road race, i shall keep it brief.

So we arrived in Dent on the Friday afternoon, post usual stag activities of buggying and quad biking. We then proceeded to the local, and only, public house for dinner and copious amounts of beer, cider, shots and cocktails. Lets just say some were worse than others.

The next day everyone woke up a little worse for wear and we were lucky the race didn't start until 1 as otherwise it would have been carnage. Then the outfits came out. Previously an email chain had occurred about the activities of the weekend and it was suggested we do the race in fancy dress, below was the outcome.

From left to right: Dave 'Spiderman' Norman, Darren 'Robin' Talbot, James 'Duffman' Bailey, Nick 'Wonderwoman' Leigh, Ian 'Ironman' Fisher, Andy 'Superman' Norman, Matt 'He-Man' Barnes, John 'Spiderman' Rogers.
I'm sure it was quite the spectacle as we jogged into town with the 400 other racers watching on. We all started at the front, i'm sure that most of the racers thought we would go out and then gradually fall back. Not so, 5 of us finished in the top 7 and Dave won! Dave has put together a thorough race report with additional photos in the link here.

I enjoyed it in a weird way, went through half marathon in about 75 high so not hanging about either on an extremely undulating course. And of course to celebrate our achievement, a curry followed by a late night clubbing session in Kendal!

I'd have to say it was probably the most extreme sporting stag do i have been on and probably won't be topped for randomness.

National road relays this weekend, hopefully a better result than the Northerns. I'll report back next week.

Still loving the Kinvara's but currently alternating each day.

Bailey